


A Flicker in the Dark

by Unholy_Author



Series: Zine Works [5]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Mondatta being a good brother, Omnic OC - Freeform, Omnic Racism, character exploration, done for the zenyatta zine, technically illegal activity, this was actually super fun to write
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-13
Updated: 2019-12-13
Packaged: 2021-02-26 17:40:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21782314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Unholy_Author/pseuds/Unholy_Author
Summary: For the Zenyatta Zine,Zenyatta has struggled since his creation with feeling like an individual, with feeling like he could be more than he was made to be. However, perhaps this will help.
Series: Zine Works [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1194684
Kudos: 10





	A Flicker in the Dark

“Zenyatta, are you ready?” Mondatta asked gently. It took Zenyatta a moment to respond, still so unused to the name they had both chosen for him weeks ago. A bond between them. Brothers. Something to introduce himself as without using the string of numbers and letters that had been assigned to him. The same string that was imprinted on his chassis. A hand came up, absently rubbing his chest through the robes he wore. It was a pointless gesture, one without a purpose, but it was one that Zenyatta found himself repeating more often the closer they came to this street.

“Yes,” he said more softly than he had intended. “Yes, I’m ready.” Mondatta nodded and chose not to comment on his hesitation, instead simply opening the door for him and waiting for him to step inside before following. 

The bell above the door chimed with their entrance, and a voice with an undercurrent of static called that they would be up to help the pair in a moment. The tattoo parlor was not a place either Zenyatta or Mondatta had been before, nor did it really seem like a place omnics would find any use for. After all, what use were ink and needles to beings who did not have skin? They could hear the background buzzing of a needle in a back room, and a hiss of pain followed by a laugh. There was a moment of anxiety as Zenyatta wondered how many humans were there and whether or not it would benefit them to come back another time. Seeming to follow his train of thought, Mondatta reached over and set a hand on his elbow for a moment.

“Thank you,” Zenyatta murmured. Mondatta let his hand fall back to his side and took a few steps away to examine a binder of art laid out on a table in the waiting area.

Zenyatta stood in front of the desk to wait, but looked around with interest. The walls were hung with designs, patterns, and photos of tattoos and piercings done on clients that had probably walked into the shop months ago. Tucked away in a far corner, Zenyatta saw a few pictures of engravings done on metal.

“Ah, sorry about the wait. What can I do for you?” the same voice from before asked as an omnic, shorter than them both and clearly more recently made, came out from the back and sat behind the desk.

“We’d like to discuss an...alteration,” Mondatta said carefully. They doubted the place that had come so recommended would share the idea of an omnic changing themself being deceit or something more malicious but in the shadow of war, the pair were unwilling to risk it. The other omnic seemed to understand and their voice dropped slightly in response to the sensitive subject, hands pulling away from the computer that they’d started to type on.

“Of course, we have a private room for engravings,” they assured the pair. “And while I have to make a note of your visit for our records, it will be anonymous.” Mondatta folded his hands together behind his back.

“We had something more removal based in mind.” The omnic nodded once, instantly understanding.

“Filing, then.”

xXx

Zenyatta, when he was first created, was made as part of a long line of omnics exactly like him. He was not created to be an individual. He was not created to have a name. The serial number that was on his chest, a simple section of slightly raised metal, was the only thing different between him and the fifty other omnics of his batch. It was the only way to prove to himself that he wasn’t simply a mirror of someone else. He’d run his fingers over the line so many times that he could have memorized it that way. As it was, they were deeply embedded in his code in such a way that he knew them from the first flicker of his array. It was a part of him. In more than just the physical place it had on his body. Those numbers were always in his head.

Years later, when he first met Mondatta, the other had refused to call Zenyatta by these numbers. That was the first time he thought about being called anything else.

xXx

The room Zenyatta and his brother were brought back to was different from the others. They’d walked down the hall and seen rooms without doors, seen a man being tattooed on his arm and a woman in her bra having a moon done between her shoulder blades. Neither of them nor the artists seemed interested when they passed. Even if they glanced up at them, they didn’t seem to react at all. The room that the omnic brought them too, however, had a firm door and a noticeable lock on the inside. The omnic did not turn it, but somehow there was comfort in just seeing the option there. It was clear that they were hardly the first omnics there to have this exact alteration done.

“My name’s FRN,” they said, holding out a hand to Mondatta with the assumption that he was the one taking more control.

“F-R-N?” he repeated as he shook their hand. They nodded.

“You don’t need to give me your names, I know that’s scary while doing something that’s still illegal in a lot of the world. But is there anything I can call you?” 

“Zen,” Zenyatta said, holding out his own hand. They laughed, the static underlay of their voice more pronounced with the sound.

“Zen, I like that. You’re gonna need some zen to sit through this, if you’re both doing it. It feels real weird, man.”

“I will be the only one having the filing done,” Zenyatta said. If FRN had some sort of reaction to this, they didn’t show it.

“Sure, sure. You look like a late service model, so it’s probably on your chest, huh?”

“Yes, it is,” he said. Mondatta glanced over at the softness of his voice but didn’t press him.

“Cool, can you just take that sleeve off for me so I can see?” they asked. Zenyatta hesitated when his hands reached up to touch the robes he wore.

xXx

Zenyatta had never intended to become part of Shambali. Part of a very visible, very well-respected group that all omnics knew, that all humans examined closely for any weakness. He was afraid he wasn’t enough for such a group. That somehow he had tricked them into thinking that he was more than he was. Putting on the robes, having the others so clearly pleased with him, finally, finally having something to be known as other than the role he was made to fill was...freeing. It was terrifying. He was so afraid of what would happen when he messed up and they realized he didn’t belong with them. When he had to go back to being only who he was pre-determined by a nameless human to be.

Zenyatta had stood in front of the mirror staring at himself for a very long time, trying to process this new state of his. The robes that covered him looked like they belonged to someone else, someone who had been made to wear them. The sleek, respectable style of them didn’t match with his scratched and worn body. He felt like there was a weight on his shoulders. His sensors assured him that there was nothing but the few ounces of robes but he still felt nearly bowed under the heaviness of whatever hung off of him. He hesitated for a moment in an attempt to steady himself before he left the room. Then he straightened his back and walked over to the door with as much calm as he could manage. He opened it, and standing on the other side with his hands folded behind his back was Mondatta.

“Are you ready, Zenyatta?” Mondatta asked gently.

xXx

“I’m ready,” Zenyatta said. His robes were tied around his waist, and he was laying flat on his back with Mondatta on one side of him and FRN on the other. FRN had a stool pulled up right next to him and was leaning over him, one arm braced on his chassis for stability.

“Alright, hold still as possible or you’ll get streaks,” they warned. The small grinder in their hand, barely larger than a human tattoo gun, was poised over his chest when it whirred to life. The noise was much louder than Zenyatta would have thought for such a small thing. It almost startled him. But he held very still and simply tilted his head toward Mondatta when FRN pressed the grinder to him. The buzzing and the sparks of the first touch almost made Zenyatta flinch out of reflex at the dramatic display, but he managed to keep still. Mondatta reached for his hand and held it silently. Zenyatta squeezed it. The feeling of the grinder stripping away even the small amount of metal that made up his serial number was not at all one of comfort, but it was also not what a human might consider painful. It was just...jarring.

“You doing okay?” FRN asked without looking up.

“Yes, I am fine,” Zenyatta said. Still, he held Mondatta’s hand. The whole process was done in just a few minutes. For something that had settled a thick line of anxiety in both Zenyatta and Mondatta, it was anticlimactic. A few minutes of incredibly loud grinding and then FRN sat back and put the tool away.

“I’m just gonna smooth this down a bit, make it look a little better,” they said as they pulled out a thin metal file. Zenyatta hummed in acknowledgment but didn’t move at all, not wanting to disrupt the process. 

“How do you feel?” Mondatta asked him gently.

“I feel...strange. I almost expect to have a hole there when I look down,” Zenyatta admitted with a soft laugh. He’d kept his eyes focused up at the ceiling through the process and even now as he felt FRN’s arm settled back on him and the drag of a rough file against metal he did not look down. Partially out of a fear that any movement may upset the work, but mostly out of a strange sense of incompletion. He wondered, if he’d been conscious during his construction, whether it may have felt something like this.

“You don’t have a hole,” Mondatta chuckled. “It looks good.”

“Of course it does. What do you think I am, an amateur?” FRN snorted as they finished up their work. They brushed a few shavings off of Zenyatta’s chassis and then rubbed the spot with their thumb to make sure there weren’t any marks. “Alright, you’re all good. Wanna go take a look in the mirror?” Zenyatta nodded and stood, walking over to the full-length mirror against the far wall. For something that felt so impactful to him, the change itself was incredibly small. If they hadn’t known what to look for, Zenyatta doubted anyone would have noticed there was anything missing. But the plane of his body that used to tie him to those who created him was blank. The smooth metal seamlessly blended with the rest of his form without revealing anything of what used to be there. He was...free.

“Thank you,” Zenyatta nearly whispered. FRN cocked their head, array brightening slightly.

“No problem.” Zenyatta stared for a moment longer, a hand drifting up to rub at the spot. It felt no different than the rest of the area. Then he started to pull his robes back up around him but paused.

“Zenyatta?” Mondatta asked. Zenyatta hummed in response.

“It’s a good thing the others already consider me the eccentric one, or this may seem odd,” he said playfully as he tied the arms of his robes around his waist. He didn’t want to cover up FRN’s work just yet. Somehow, it seemed too important to hide.

**Author's Note:**

> Want more of my work? Check me out [on Twitter! ](https://twitter.com/UnholyAuthor)


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